Grade+11+Mod+1+Unit+1

//** CLOSE READING AND TEXTUAL ANALYSIS **//

toc

** Online resources **
Engage NY Unit One lessons

Simple Close reading strategies

Rhetorical strategies

** Objectives **
Students read, discuss, and analyze literary and nonfiction texts focusing on how authors relate textual elements, such as plot, character, and central ideas, within a text. This unit also establishes key protocols and routines for reading, writing, and discussion that will continue throughout the year. It considers the important role point of view plays in literature and literary nonfiction and **how authors develop central ideas through careful manipulations of a reader’s perception of character.** The first unit begins with a close reading of Robert Browning’s “My Last Duchess,” in which students **examine character development and choices regarding point of view as they analyze the development of central ideas in the poem**. A close reading of William Shakespeare’s soliloquies, monologues, and dialogues in Hamlet expands students’ understanding of **how an author may use characterization and point of view to shape central ideas.** Finally, in an **examination of rhetoric and point of view** in an excerpt from Virginia Woolf’s students use Virginia Woolf’s contemporary feminist perspective as a lens through which to consider the relationship of power and gender in Shakespearean England.

** Common Core Standards **
Cite strong and thorough textual evidence to support analysis of what the text says explicitly as well as inferences drawn from the text, including determining where the text leaves matters uncertain.
 * CCSS.ELA-Literacy.RI.11-12.1 **

Determine two or more central ideas of a text and analyze their development over the course of the text, including how they interact and build on one another to provide a complex analysis; provide an objective summary of the text.
 * CCSS.ELA-Literacy.RI.11-12.2 **

Analyze a complex set of ideas or sequence of events and explain how specific individuals, ideas, or events interact and develop over the course of the text.
 * CCSS.ELA-Literacy.RI.11-12.3 **

Determine the meaning of words and phrases as they are used in a text, including figurative, connotative, and technical meanings; analyze how an author uses and refines the meaning of a key term or terms over the course of a text
 * CCSS.ELA-Literacy.RI.11-12.4 **

Determine an author's point of view or purpose in a text in which the rhetoric is particularly effective, analyzing how style and content contribute to the power, persuasiveness or beauty of the text.
 * CCSS.ELA-Literacy.RI.11-12.6 **

**W.2** write explanatory texts to convey ideas and information clearly and accurately **W.9** draw evidence from texts to support analysis **W.4** produce clear and coherent writing.

Texts
// Central Idea: role of gender relations in power structures // Shakespeare’s //Hamlet// Robert Browning’s “The Last Duchess” Virginia Woolf’s “A Room of One’s Own” (nonfiction) Arthur Miller’s //The Crucible//
 * Group 1: Women’s Roles **

// Central Idea: capitalism and its effects on the pursuit of the American Dream // John Steinbeck’s //Of Mice and Men// Arthur Miller’s //Death of a Salesman// chapter six from Thomas Friedman’s The World is Flat (nonfiction) Excerpt from Barbara Ehrenreich’s //Nickel and Dimed// (Springboard)
 * Group 2: Difficulties of the American Dream **

// Central Idea: assimilation, cultural identity and nationalism in society // Junot Diaz’s //Drown// Arthur Miller’s //A View from the Bridge// //Zeitoun// by Dave Eggers (nonfiction) Excerpt from Working, "Roberto Acuna Talks about Farm Workers," by Studs Terkel (Springboard) //Generation Kill// by Evan Wright (nonfiction, book, blog, miniseries) Houghton Mifflin 11th grade workbook pages 76- 84, Unit, “How do writers convey their perceptions of war?”
 * Group 3: The Outsider Experience in America **

Academic Vocabulary
(taught in context of lessons and readings)
 * Close read
 * Analyze
 * Inference
 * Central idea
 * Develop
 * Diction
 * Tone
 * Ambiguity/ambiguous
 * Rhetoric- irony, rhetorical questions, sentence structure

Reading Analysis
Text-based question stems for close reading analysis

1. What specific words and phrases does the speaker use to describe (fill in the blank)? 2. What do these words suggest about (fill in the blank)? 3. Who is the speaker? How do you know? 4. What does (fill in the blank) (vocabulary word) mean in this context? 5. What does “fill in the blank quote” (specific quote from text) imply about the speaker’s view on? 6. The function of (fill in the blank) (specific quote from text) is to (fill in the blank).

Writing Assignments
Writing Assignments- student must use specific textual evidence to answer the following in a paragraph or more.

1. How does the speaker’s use of (lit element/technique) contribute to his/her characterization? 2. What is the author’s central idea in this text? Where do we see evidence of this idea? 3. Where in the text do we see ambiguity, and what is the purpose? 4. Explain how the author uses a lit technique to develop the theme.

Longer Writing Assignments (3-4 paragraphs) 1. How does the writer develop the protagonist’s character in relation to other characters? 2. (Hamlet)Identify two central ideas from the play. How do these ideas interact and build on one another over the course of the play? In your response, identify and discuss at least one literary device that Shakespeare uses to develop or relate these central ideas 3. (Hamlet and A Room of One’s Own) Analyze the relationship between Woolf’s text and the character of Ophelia.

Assessment
// Note: Adapt question to other texts as appropriate. //
 * End of the Unit Assessment **


 * Text-Based Response **

Your Task: Based on your close reading of “My Last Duchess,” Hamlet, and A Room of One’s Own, write a well-developed, multi-paragraph response to the following prompt:

Select a central idea common to all three texts. How do the authors develop this idea over the course of each text? How do the texts work together to build your understanding of this central idea?

Your response will be assessed using the Text Analysis Rubric.

Guidelines Be sure to: • Closely read the prompt • Organize your ideas and evidence • Develop a claim that responds directly to all parts of the prompt • Cite strong and thorough textual evidence to support your analysis • Follow the conventions of standard written English